J.M Barrie's Peter Pan has delighted children and grown-ups alike for decades. And for good reason. It is a book that makes one feel like a child again, makes your imagination go wild and your heart warm.
Now, almost a century later, comes the official sequel, Peter Pan in Scarlet. The only way I can describe how good this book is, is by saying that it was worth the wait.
This is a book that reminds you why you fell in love with reading in the first place. This is a wondrous piece of work that does the impossible: surpass the original. Author Geraldine McCaughrean manages to write a book that is pure magic.
Taking place roughly two decades after the events of the original, the story revolves around Wendy and the lost boys - all grown up now - who have to go back to Neverland to try to stop their dreams about Neverland from leaking into their lives as adults. So back they go, and what they find is a completely changed Neverland, and a transformed Peter Pan, a Peter Pan in Scarlet. Saying anymore would be a crime. Suffice to say, this is a book that will warm your heart, set your imagination on fire, and enchant you no matter how young or old you are. A literary dream come true.
From the late 1990s onwards, the work of Dean Koontz took on a somewhat jarring tone. Novels like Sole Survivor (1997), One Door Away from Heaven (2001), Odd Thomas (2003), and Innocence (2013), were all repetitive thrillers about lost characters in search of redemption, or innocent characters hunted down by irredeemably evil figures, with most of the stories having a religious undercurrent that could be pretty off-putting. Some of these books worked. Many of them didn’t.
Since The Taking, originally published in 2004, seemed more of the same, I dove into it with low expectations, giving it a go mainly because, in an interview with Koontz that I came across recently, he mentioned that he considered The Taking one of his all-time favorite books.
The Taking revolves around Molly and Niel Sloan, who wake up in the middle of the night to the sound of pouring rain, a cataclysmic downpour that threatens to drown their small California town. Quickly, the young couple senses that something tremendous is going on, maybe even the end of the world as they know it. So they venture out of the safety of their home, and seek their neighbors, feeling the need to band together against this otherworldly threat. But they soon come to realize that their neighbors are not what they seem, and that what’s going on surpasses their worst nightmares.
The Taking is Koontz going full-throttle, for better or worse. The book is immensely readable, a true page-turner, and the main character, Molly, is a likable, vulnerable, but innately strong character. But Koontz’s penchant for heavy-handed prose and preachiness also shine through, and he seems more interested in atmosphere and creating a sense of cosmic dread, than in structuring a satisfying plot.
And that’s the thing about The Taking: it’s virtually plotless. The whole story revolves around a concept, not a plot, of seemingly omnipotent and malevolent beings taking over the world, and how Molly and her husband deal with that. There are some interesting sidetracks, and the dialogue is crisp throughout, but the book feels like a short story or a novella expanded into a novel.
That isn’t necessarily a bad thing. And The Taking isn’t a bad book. In fact, it’s a very good one, and, surprisingly, turns out to be one of Koontz’s best, mainly because of Koontz’s ability to hone in on his obsession and fascination with the concept of pure evil, and how good people confront it.
The Taking is a truly disturbing descent into a hellish situation, into a world subverted by evil and paranoia. And even if the scale of the story isn’t as epic as it pretends to be, the imagery, the philosophical implications, and the final revelation make this a haunting metaphysical thriller that leaves a lasting impression and plenty of food for thought.
Recommended for fans of the author and for newcomers alike.
Ahmed Khalifa is a filmmaker and novelist. He is the writer/director of several short films and a feature, which was released on Netflix, and the author of a number of novels and short stories, including the YA horror novel, Beware The Stranger, available on Amazon. He is also the host of The Dark Fantastic Podcast. Find him on Twitter @AFKhalifa and on Facebook @DFantasticPodcast
A literary experiment comprised of 12 interconnected novellas, about an amnesiac vigilante who hunts down killers who have escaped the grip of the law. This is Koontz at his darkest and angriest, a side of him that readers rarely get to see, especially in the past 30 years or so. The main character is interesting if too enigmatic for his own good, and the 12 stories vary in quality and style. The first season is more episodic in nature, which makes for a somewhat uneven bunch of tales, but with each installment the main story, of the secrets behind Nameless's mission, gets darker and more exciting, all leading up to an ending that, though not very surprising, is powerful and moving, if a bit troubling in its implication that violence maybe inescapable and comes at a high cost. A must for Koontz fans, and a perfect introduction to readers new to his work.
Ahmed Khalifa is a filmmaker and novelist. He is the writer/director of several short films and a feature, which was released on Netflix, and the author of a number of novels and short stories, including the YA horror novel, Beware The Stranger, available on Amazon. Find him on Twitter @AFKhalifa and on Facebook @Dark.Fantastic.AK·Writer
Film Review: 30 Days Of Night: Dark Days (2010): I liked the feature film adaptation of the graphic novel 30 Days Of Night, but I didn't love it. The film was suspenseful, atmospheric, even occasionally frightening, and stylishly directed by David Slade. But the characters weren't that appealing, and the vampires pretty annoying. The sequel, 30 Days Of Night: Dark Days, is a far better film, in my opinion.
Co-scripted by Steve Niles (the author of the original graphic novel, and who wasn't involved in the making of the first film) and stylishly directed by Ben Ketai, Dark Days, is far more loyal to the source material, and the characters much more well-defined. The pace is better, and, despite the much lower budget, the atmosphere is thicker and the fright-factor higher.
Following the adventures of Stella Oleson (Olemaun in the graphic novel) and her quest for vengeance for the death of her husband, Eben, the film's pace never lets up while never sacrificing characterization for cheap thrills. Kiele Sanchez shines as Stella, a strong-willed warrior struggling with depression and trying to stave off madness with all her will. Working with a low budget and a good script, director Ben Ketai manages to do what David Slade couldn't in the first film, which is tell a good story, as the film is visually compelling, tightly edited, and dramatically effective at the same time.
Fans of the original film (not the original graphic novel) may scoff at the smaller scale and shift of focus and tone. But fans of the original graphic novel and good horror films will probably enjoy this ambitious low-budget effort for what it is: one of the best vampire films of recent years.
Arthur Conan Doyle's creation of sleuth extraordinaire Sherlock Holmes revolutionized detective fiction and continues to do so to this day. I doubt there is a single writer of crime or detective fiction who hasn't read some or all of the work of Doyle and has been influenced by it, by the clinical attention to detail, the strong sense of atmosphere, the sharp dialogue, and above all, the sense of fun.
Although Doyle had retired Holmes a long while before the author's own death, writers continue to churn out pastiches; some are good, some are bad and some are brilliant. The Tangled SkeinandThe Italian Secretary fall somewhere between good and brilliant.
The Tangled Skein by David Stuart Davies focuses on Sherlock Holmes facing the lord of the undead himself, Dracula. And although the premise sounds ludicrous and could even be considered an insult to Doyle's work, the resulting book is neither. Author and Holmes expert David Stuart Davies captures Doyle's tone and style almost perfectly and weaves a tale full of action and mood. It is a well-told tale that stays true to the mythos and features dialogue that could have been written by the master himself. Where the book falters a bit is in the mystery aspect. In trying to combine the mythologies of both Doyle and Bram Stoker's work, Davies veers more towards the plotting style of Stoker, with more action than intrigue. Although that makes it a rousing thriller , full of atmosphere and foreboding, it also makes it a not very good mystery. But there is an added bonus here. Davies ingeniously adds the very neat twist of making this story a direct sequel to The Hound of the Baskervilles. Something that avid Holmes readers will find delightful. I did.
William H. Hallahan is hardly a prolific author. In the past forty years, since the start of his career as an author, he has written a dozen books (fiction and non-fiction); the most well-known is the supernatural thriller, The Search For Joseph Tully, considered by some to be a minor masterpiece of atmospheric horror.
The Monk, published in 1983, is another of what Hallahan calls his "occult novels", books which feature demons, psychics, astral projection, and epic battles between forces of Good and Evil. The Monk tells the story of a young man with a purple aura, a supremely benevolent human being destined to end the war between Satan and God's angels, led by fallen angel Timothy. Across thousands of years, the battle has raged on, with Satan and his minion, The Black Hawk, managing to kill each and every one of the children born with purple auras, before Timothy and his familiar, a dog named Repentance, could get to them and complete the ceremony required to win the war against The Devil. What ensues is partly a chase novel, partly a metaphysical/mystical thriller, about a young man trapped between two warring cosmic forces that both want him for their own.
The Monk is a bizarre book. It is a sprawling and somewhat disjointed story, jumping from the creation of Man, to Heaven and Hell, to present day New York, to set-pieces featuring demons, banshees, and devils, to a love story between the book's protagonist and his lover, to a monastery which houses a possible Satan-worshiper! That is not to say that The Monk is a bad book, or even an average one. Far from it. This is an endlessly compelling story, energetically told. But Hallahan's straightforward prose occasionally is too flavorless for its own good, while the novel's first part is so convoluted that I almost gave up on it before getting to the good stuff, about halfway into the book.
But what Hallahan has going for him is the sheer readability of the book. No matter how strange and disjointed the story gets, one just can't stop reading! Which, I guess, is a sure sign of a good book, or, at least, a hell of an entertaining one.
Although flawed, with the climax being especially disappointing, this is one fun ride, with scenes of brilliantly conceived suspense, and a hypnotic, dreamy atmosphere. Recommended.
Ahmed Khalifa is a filmmaker and novelist. He is the writer/director of several short films and a feature, which was released on Netflix, and the author of a number of novels and short stories, including the YA horror novel, Beware The Stranger, available on Amazon. Find him on Twitter @AFKhalifa and on Facebook @Dark.Fantastic.AK·Writer
